I think I'll keep them :)

Warms a mother's heart!! I thought I would share this photo of Alex vacuuming the living room at our house. Technically this is his chore and he should do it at least once a week. Most weeks I have to tell him, then he whines, procrastinates, and tries to get out of it. This week he stepped up, grabbed the vacuum and got to work. He is such a good boy. (most of the time :)

We took Lucas this weekend to get his ear pierced. A lot of people won't agree with my decision to allow him to get this done but I did it for several reasons.
1. He is a good kid who does amazing in school and shows extreme responsibility skills for someone his age.
2. It was something he wanted and I wanted it done right using sterilized materials. I have two older brothers who would go to their friends over the weekend, have a friend pierce their ear, come home and my Dad would make them take it out. That was my Dad's decision, he was entitled, they are his kids. That was 20 years ago, the world had ugly funks back then that could be caught on a dirty needle (or ear ring). Imagine all that on steroids and you have what kids face today.
3. It wasn't that big a deal to me. He wears it for a while, gets tired of it and takes it out. Or he never tires of it and wears it all his life. Who cares? You have to pick your battles and this was not a battle for us at all.
4. He asked for it almost two years ago when he was 10 years old. I said no, I told him I wouldn't say no forever but I wasn't going to get it done when he was so young. I told him to think about it and if he still wanted to do it in a couple of years we would talk. So this was not a spur of the moment decision.
5. I told him I had authority to make him take out any earring I thought was inappropriate or just looked stupid. He agreed.
So here are a few photos I snapped when he took him to have it done. Love that kid!